Maude Raymond may not want to be the person who points all that out, but she would be happy to be the person that pushes for equality in skiing.
I don’t even want to go into details, it’s annoying, I just see people as humans. Is it even about gender? Yes, there is a reality, but there are also fewer women than men in the sport.
But things are improving, so I don’t want to make the gap even bigger.
There’s a mom in Quebec, one of my friends, and there was a slope event there. They tried to call me and get me involved, in their group to bitch about how it’s not equal pay, between male and female. I just said I was not going to get into that like I’m not going to be with them to get equal prize-money. I asked them how many girls are competing in the event and how many guys? For guys, there were maybe 50 and I think there were 3 girls. I said: ‘right now it is kind of fair then, I wish it was different’. Rather than protest and fight for equal pay, let’s just get women more comfortable. That’s what I’ve always been doing.
I’ve always done camps, I do MAAD Camps, for girls, for women. They’re snowboarding and skiing together. I’ve been trying the best I can, in my own way, to give girls opportunities. The motto behind MAAD is: ‘let’s give girls opportunities.’
I don’t even try to compare us with men. Let’s just focus on what’s going right and enhance them.
That’s what I think about all that. If you want to dissect it, I’m not interested, but let’s talk about what’s good. Let’s talk about how things are improving. When I started skiing freestyle, I was the only woman, but I never really paid attention to it. I was just like: ‘let’s do this.’ And more and more girls started doing it and I just wanted to see everybody as a team, rather than the opposite.
I never look at statistics, it is a men’s world and it is a men’s sport, but I’ve always just tried to make the best of it.
So what are your views on the 'traditional' stereotypes, like flower prints on girl's skis?
Flowers are cool, it’s not about having flowers on skis, or pink, it’s all about the balance. The balance of how you’re creating something, Flowers could be cool, it all depends on how they look. Flowers could even be cool on men’s skis, it just depends on how you make them. So it’s not about what’s on the women’s products, it’s a balance of the perspectives.
I’m more of a unisex person. Obviously, there are shapes that would be more advantageous to women and the same for men. I’m not really a stereotype, I don’t like blue, I’m more of a pink person. People probably wouldn’t even think that pink would be my favorite color, but there are plenty of guys that like pink too.
You were Freeskier female of the year in 2013, that must have been a highlight?
It was a highlight, but I didn’t realize it was a highlight then because I was just starting to exactly what I wanted: just doing videos. I created all my edits, I would try to find videos to edit with them. There was a lot of work to it because I had to sell my vision and I didn’t have the budget to create the videos. Companies —even my sponsors— didn’t really believe in women filming. Now, when I look back at those first edits, that made me win Female skier in 2013, they’re basic. They are flavourful, but it could have been so much better if I had the budget to do that. I learned how to create my first intro, I grabbed a different filmer and explained my vision, I would tell him where to edit and film. I directed the whole thing and that was fun. With all the work I put in, I had to push and sell my vision.
I would say stuff like: ‘yes I don’t do double corks, but I swear it’s gonna go somewhere, we’re going to figure this out!’
I had to go through a lot of videographers, because as I was traveling, I didn’t have the budget to bring the same one with me, so I had to work with so many different people. I’m very precise when we edit, so I’d redo it, redo it…
So the award was an honor because I thought it might be a step in the right direction and I loved doing it. I just wish I’d had more budget because I still had to make a living that winter and that was hard to do that.
When I won I was happy, but I didn’t realize that it was that big of a deal. I always thought that it was super cool, but then I’m almost shy about it, I don’t know how to explain. That season, 2013, I had my cards. The year before, I broke my back and I was kicked off of team Canada, anyway, because I didn’t have enough points. I didn’t have enough points, I didn’t have enough results, fair enough I was out.
So I broke my back and at the end of that season, I blew my knee. I got it repaired and I worked out that I had five months. I had half an ACL and a fake ACL, with a hamstring braided together, so I could get back on the slopes better. I was training twice-a-day, sleeping eight to nine hours a night, I was super-serious, eating super-good, had my trainer, had my PT, everyone was following me. When I got the ok from my surgeon, I took my car and went to Colorado, for Dew Tour.
It was the trials for the Olympics, the first selection. I already had my cards for the first World Tour selection, which was three weeks after Dew Tour. I called the guy that was organizing Dew Tour and he gave me a spot. I went there, I was training in Colorado, I drove there from Montreal that’s all I was aiming for, for six months. I got there and started training. My tricks were on point, everything was on point and I was pretty excited for it. Then I went to the gym in Colorado and I see two of the coaches from team Canada and I was stoked to see them. They were like: ‘Oh my god, we saw you skiing. Things are good, you seem healthy, we would suggest that you maybe don’t do this contest, so you can focus on the first World Tour selection.’
I had just spent a full week, questioning everyone, calling and texting them non-stop, talking to everyone and then the weather seemed to be bad for the Dew Tour contest, so I decided to give my spot away, so I can focus on the World Tour selection, that was coming in three weeks. I didn’t want to take any risks, but it had been six months, so I was ready for it.
The day of the contest, I go up to cheer on everyone and I remember seeing Danielle ? being like: ‘Maude, what are you doing?’
I told her left my spot so I can focus on the other one and I had already paid for my cards for the World tour.
She asked if I’d received the email? Team Canada sent an email to everyone, and they sent it to my old email, that in order to do the first World Tour, you had to do Dew Tour.
So I was completely f*cked over. The coaches had told me not to do it but then sent an email to my old address that I couldn’t do that now. They felt terrible about it and it was a decision from the top of Team Canada. I gave my spot to Kim Lamarre, she went all the way to the Olympics and won a Bronze medal. Because I couldn’t do it, I spent two weeks at home crying, I couldn’t move, because I dedicated so much time to that, I worked so hard and they kind of just stole my dream away. So that’s when I started filming. I went home and spent two weeks being sad, came back after Christmas and was like: ‘let’s film!’.
So female skier of the year award came from the disappointment of missing out on the Olympics?
Yeah, kind of getting screwed over, having my dream taken away, I started doing that and also trying to get people to believe in women, by creating something with no budget.
When I saw you in Sweden, in May, you hurt your knee. Is that ok now?
I’ve had 18 knee injuries so I don’t even know which one you’re talking about. I had Gangrene/necrosis. I had a bad knee in Sweden, but that happened on the spot, my knee was ok before. That’s ok now, but I would just say that my knees are very weak, I’ve had 18 knee surgeries, 4 ACLs, I almost lost my leg two years ago, with necrosis. A lot of things happened, but that’s part of my career, for sure.
What inspired you to start your own brand; MAAD Love?
I always wanted to do a clothing brand, since I was little. I was doing a bunch of sports and I was always the one that was wearing different things. I would bring something non-technical and tweak it a bit to make it more suited to the sports in was doing. I don’t know, it was just different. I’ve always wanted to do something. The idea behind MAAD was to create something balanced. Like focused for women, but men can also wear it. It’s to create a women’s environment in sports and lifestyle.
There’s a bigger idea behind it, but it’s not perfectly defined. I was doing a bunch of collaborations with all of my sponsors, signature products, which I love. I love creating products for women or men. I just loved it. I love brands so much, so I started doing a bunch of collabs, knowing that I wanted to do my clothing line at some point.
For a minute I didn’t even know if I wanted to do a clothing line, or a commercial agency with videos, photos and all that, like a media-house or even just a big woman-community. It’s to-be-defined, but things are going good.
So looking forward, do you have much planned for this winter?
Yes, I want to create videos as of next winter, from December. On slopes, a little bit of park, like flowy lines in the park, and backcountry. I want to make them very flavourful and based on style. I’m also planning on doing a women’s workshop at Woodward’s new facility in Park City. That’d be for skiers and snowboarders. I want to be around Park City because it’s easier to do backcountry, park, and slope, you have it all and you have good weather to film. For Spring I’m going to go back to BC and film there a bit. I also want to do a short trip to Chamonix. I really want to focus on doing content around here, for those videos. In the last few years, I’ve been taking a lot of photos for Armada and all that stuff. I kind of want to focus on my skiing, on my videos and what I do have a vision. I can focus on doing that for myself and bettering myself, as a skier, now that I’m healthy. Doing that with the little MAAD workshops, I love it.
Maude’s favorite:
Trip: It’s between Whistler, Mammoth, Japan, and Colorado! I can’t choose just one, they’re all so awesome.
Trick: Switch 3. They just feel so good and so comfortable. I can go big or small, they’re just so floaty and fun.
Track: That’s such a hard question, but I ride with very smooth songs. It changes all the time so I can’t really pick just one.
